A wide variety of materials must be stored and transported from one location to another. For example, materials in the food industry, such as condiments, must be shipped from the manufacturer to the end user, which may be a restaurant, for example. Similarly, many materials in the medical industry must be stored and shipped, such as pharmaceuticals, fluids, and biologics, for example. Further, acids, solvents, bases, photoresists, slurries, detergents and cleaning formulations, dopants, inorganic, organic, metalorganics, TEOS, and biological solutions, DNA and RNA solvents and reagents, pharmaceuticals, hazardous waste, radioactive chemicals, and nanomaterials, including for example, fullerenes, inorganic nanoparticles, sol-gels, and other ceramics may also be filled, at one location and transported to another location for use.
Traditional storage/shipping containers may include two general types: 1. flexible liners that may be used with an overpack; and 2. rigid containers. Flexible liners may generally be comprised of a relatively thin-walled plastic material, such that the liner may be generally flexible, and are not free-standing. Accordingly, for many uses, a flexible liner may require an outer container or overpack. The overpack in such systems may be a rigid container. In these systems, the liner may often be configured for a one-time use, while the overpack may be configured for a one-time use or multiple uses. The overpack may be comprised of: metal; a relatively hard and thick plastic; glass; wood; a thick and durable fiber-based product, such as cardboard; or some combination thereof. Because the flexible liner of such systems is not typically free-standing, the overpack and liner are often shipped together. Rigid containers, on the other hand, may be used without a flexible liner, in some cases. For example, glass bottles or metal or plastic drums or cans may be used without a liner for some applications. Whether a flexible liner is used with an overpack, or a rigid container is used without a liner, for many applications, materials may be filled at one location and transported in a rigid container to another location for use.
This process may typically include two or three distinct shipping steps, each of which may be associated with a shipping cost that may in turn increase the cost of the material being shipped for the end-user, and/or any other intermediaries. Thus, ideally the costs associated with shipping should be minimized as much as possible. Factors that may generally contribute to the cost of shipping may include the volume and/or weight of the items being shipped. Therefore, the cost of shipping may be lessened if an improved method of shipping were to include either shipping the same amount of material in less space and/or shipping the same amount of material in packaging that weighs less than traditional packaging, for one or more of the shipping steps. Generally the three shipping steps may include: 1. shipping empty containers from the container manufacturer to the chemical or other material supplier for filling; 2. after the supplier has filled the containers with the desired contents, shipping the full (or partially full, as desired) containers to an end-user for dispense; and 3. after the end-user dispenses the material in the container, in some cases, shipping the empty container to another facility for disposal, recycling, and/or sterilization and reuse.
Traditional rigid containers, including overpacks for flexible liners, can be disadvantageous because such containers/overpacks commonly have only a single static expanded state, in that regardless of whether the container is empty or full, the container has the same shape and therefore takes up the same amount of space. Thus, when empty containers are shipped from the container manufacturer to a supplier to be filled, the containers disadvantageously occupy the same shipping volume as they do when they are full. Further, traditional rigid containers/overpacks are often generally cylindrically shaped; for example, bottles, cans, and drums may all be generally cylindrically shaped. Consequently, even when a plurality of rigid cylindrically-shaped objects are densely packed such that they are immediately adjacent one another, their cylindrical shape results in areas of empty, wasted space between the cylinders. Such inability of many traditional rigid containers/overpacks to either collapse into a relatively smaller size when empty, and/or to efficiently densely pack together to efficiently use shipping space can increase the cost of shipping and ultimately the cost of the material being shipped.
Accordingly, there is a need for a container that is more cost-effective to transport than traditional containers. More particularly, there is a need for a container that is more cost-effective to transport when it is both empty and filled.